The first step he gives is to create a timeline of the main plot and the subplot. Then look for areas where they connect. More likely than not, he writes, you will probably find connections you didn’t realize were there which you can take advantage of to not only build the subplot, but to also add conflict and range to the main plot.

The second step he gives is to interweave the characters. Don’t give secondary characters just one role in the book—give them multiple roles. For example—have your heroine’s best friend be the doctor who has to tell the hero his father has died in an accident. Or your hero’s brother is the man who put the heroine’s father’s hardware store out of business by bringing in a big franchise chain-store. These connections don’t have to be revealed early—in fact connections like these are sometimes better left for an “aha” moment later in the story where it will create the most tension/suspense. (If you’re a fan of the TV show Lost, think about how all of the characters keep showing up in each other’s backstory—it’s almost a game to see who’s going to pop up in someone else’s “real world” life.) If you have a large cast of secondary and minor characters, look for those whose jobs you can combine into just one character and give that character a bigger role.

But something that can happen with character interconnectedness is a feeling that the relationship is contrived. You have to be able to justify to yourself and to the reader why the connection or interrelationship is there—to convince the reader through building realistic characters that this really could happen. That two men named Desmond and Jack could arbitrarily meet each other while running steps in a stadium one day and then three years later find themselves facing each other with guns in their hands down in a weird, psychological-experiment bunker on a seemingly deserted island in the middle of nowhere. (Have I mentioned I’m addicted to Lost?)

Third, if you are having trouble choosing characters to use for your subplot, look at the range of your main characters’ lives. Who is in their life from a different background or social stratus who can weave in and out and bring contrast and conflict to the story? Is there someone of a different “level” with whom your main character can change places—one experiences a sudden fall while the other a sudden elevation?

Fourth, be sure your subplot is not the same storyline as your main plot. Two Cinderellas in one story isn’t going to strengthen it if they both meet their princes and live happily ever after. Be sure your subplot provides some contrast to and conflict for the main plot. Remember the example in my first post in this series on the two subplots in Pride and Prejudice: Charlotte and Jane. Both provide contrast to Lizzy’s story—Charlotte’s story by challenging Lizzy’s ideals of romance, and Jane’s by challenging Lizzy’s trust in true love conquering all.

Finally, don’t let your subplot steal the show. Have you ever seen a movie where a minor character is either so charming, or so funny, or so intense that the scenes he’s in sparkle and the rest of the film falls flat? (Think Pumba and Timon in The Lion King or Chaucer in A Knight’s Tale.) You don’t want that to happen to your main plot. So, while having a well-developed subplot can be important, don’t spend so much time developing the subplot that your main story suffers.

I’ve recently adopted a quote by the writer of historical novels Jeff Shaara: “When the characters are ready, the story will come out of me.” In my case, this has been true with each of the manuscripts I’ve completed. The characters drove the story. It’s just a matter of coming up with the right characters in the right circumstances.

Developing a successful subplot depends mainly on choosing the right characters to work with. You do not have to incorporate additional POV characters to do this—one of your POV characters can be involved in the subplot.

For example, in the movie Signs, the main plot of the movie (spoiler if you haven’t seen it) is about the impending invasion by hostile aliens, heralded by the crop circles in Rev. Graham Hess’s corn field. In a super-minor subplot (a conversation he has with two other people), we learn Graham’s younger brother Merrill was a minor league baseball player years ago with the record for most homeruns—and most strikeouts. “Felt wrong not to swing.” In what seems like another unrelated thread, we learn that Graham used to be a pastor but has fallen away from the church as a result of his wife’s accidental death. We see flashbacks throughout the story and eventually learn that the town veterinarian (a cameo by the film’s writer/director M. Night Shyamalan) fell asleep at the wheel and hit Graham’s wife on the side of the road, pinning her to a tree where she lingered long enough for Graham to arrive and speak to her. So what, we wonder, does this have to do with the hostile aliens who want to kill everyone? There is a touching scene of dialogue between Graham and Merrill about faith. We know that what happened in this subplot has affected the way our main character views the world. But it isn’t until the climax of the main plot, when the alien whose fingers Graham chopped off is holding the little boy about to kill him that we discover the significance of the subplot: as she spoke her final words, Graham’s wife gave him the solution. “Tell Graham to see . . . And tell Merrill to swing away.” Graham looks around the room and SEES the trophy baseball bat on the wall . . . and ding the subplot provides the resolution for the main plot. Graham repeats the words to Merrill, who then grabs the bat and does what he does best—swings it—eventually bringing about the demise of the alien.

In Writing the Breakout Novel, Don Maass spends a chapter on multiple POVs and subplots in which he gives some requirements for the development and use of subplots.

1. Subplots need to have a good reason for existing and should be interconnected with the rest of the story. He recommends looking for minor characters to use who are already close to the main character: family, friends, colleagues. He cautions against trying to use characters who are seemingly unrelated to the main story unless the connection will be revealed early on.

2. Subplots need to tie-in with and affect the main plot. If the subplot isn’t going to either help or hinder the ultimate resolution of the conflict of your main plot, it is just a rabbit-trail. So look for characters/subplot opportunities that can increase tension, create conflict, and raise the stakes for your main plot.

3. Subplots give you the opportunity to explore what Maass refers to as “range”: portraying a variety of experience. I had trouble understanding this until I related it to my own life. I don’t exist just as a copy editor for a small publishing house. I am a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a cousin. I am a member of a church in an area of town that is known for being well-to-do—but I don’t live in that area of town. I am a single, 35-year-old woman who is a happy member of a Sunday School class of married couples in their mid-40s and up. I sing in the choir. For the last six years, I’ve been a part-time student. I am former Vice President and current Educational Coordinator for the largest professional organization for Christian fiction writers in the world. Do you see where I’m going with this? If I were a character in a novel, looking at the range or full scope of my life there are several areas from which to pull interesting characters for subplots—family, coworkers, people at church, fellow college students, other ACFW officers or members, etc. We do not live in isolation—our characters shouldn’t either (unless that’s the plot of your novel!).

How many? Maass immediately follows these rules with the discussion of how many subplots to include. His take: “Two or three major subplots are about all that even the longest quest fantasies can contain.” Remember, the reason you’re writing your novel is the main plot. You don’t want to pull the reader’s attention away from it—except when it will build additional suspense. You also don’t want your readers to feel there are too many characters and so much going on that they can’t make sense of what your story is about.

So, look at your novel. If you feel you have too many subplots, determine which are rabbit-trails and which affect the outcome of the main plot. Focus on one or two and start exploring their merit. Do they connect, add complications, and extend the range of the main plot?

So, over the next few posts, I’m going to be delving into subplots: what they are, how to write them, and how to make sure they’re well incorporated into the story so they don’t detract from the main plot, but enhance it.

In Plot Ansen Dibell writes:

Well handled, [subplots] can deepen the story’s context, offer ways to mirror or contrast with the main action, and be used in pacing to offer foreground motion while the main plot is in a temporary lull. When the main plot is busy, they can generate suspense when the narrative splits off to follow the subplot for a while before rejoining the main action, generally with added momentum and impact when they again converge.

Laura Yeager, in her article “Put a Subplot to Work in Your Story” (The Writer, October 2006) writes:

The subplot will either contrast with or run parallel to the main plot. For instance, say you’re writing a story about a woman who wants to get married and is looking for a husband. A subplot in this story might belong to a character who is through with men altogether. This contrasts with the main plot. Or, say you’re writing the same story about a woman who wants to get married. But let’s say her friend also wants to get married.
This plot could possibly run parallel to the main plot.

This example reminds me of two subplots in one of my favorite novels, Pride & Prejudice: Charlotte and Jane. Charlotte’s story—a woman marrying not for love but to avoid being a spinster for the rest of her life—contrasts Lizzy’s story:

“Engaged to Mr. Collins! My dear Charlotte—impossible!” . . .
“Why should you be surprised my dear Eliza? Do you think it incredible that Mr. Collins should be able to procure any woman’s good opinion, because he was not so happy as to succeed with you? . . . I am not romantic you know. I never was. I ask only a comfortable home; and considering Mr. Collins’ character, connections, and situation in life, I am convinced that my chance of happiness with him is as fair as most people can boast on entering the marriage state.” . . .
Elizabeth was then left to reflect on what she had heard. . . . She had always felt that Charlotte’s opinion of matrimony was not exactly like her own, but she could not have supposed it possible that when called into action, she would have sacrificed every better feeling to worldly advantage. . . . And to the pang of a friend disgracing herself and sunk inher esteem, was added the distressing conviction that it was impossible for that friend to be tolerably happy in the lot she had chosen.

If you are familiar with the story, you will remember that later, Lizzy visits Charlotte and Mr. Collins for six weeks and is surprised by how content Charlotte is with the life she has chosen. Mr. Collins is still as annoying as ever, but Charlotte has reconciled herself to her husband’s ways and is happy in the knowledge that she has a secure future. This contrasts with Elizabeth’s romanticism—especially since the first proposal from Darcy comes at the Collins’ cottage—who has sworn never to marry unless for love.

Jane’s story both parallels and contrasts Lizzy’s. Jane and Bingley openly fall in love while Lizzy and Darcy are antagonistic toward each other (although are also falling in love). Jane and Bingley are then torn apart because of the interference of his sisters and Darcy because they feel Jane isn’t good enough for him. Darcy, in the meantime, proposes to Lizzy in spite of his “sense of her inferiority—of its being a degradation—of the family obstacles which judgment had always opposed to inclination.” In this instance, the Jane/Bingley subplot provides conflict for the main plot, as it is Darcy’s part in separating Jane from Bingley that drives Elizabeth to not just decline Darcy’s proposal, but to do it in such a way as to make him change his ways and do what he can to save Elizabeth’s family’s reputation to redeem himself from his “ungentlemanly” behavior. At the end, after Elizabeth has accepted Darcy’s proposal, the two couples are once again contrasted, as the family gathers in the sitting room after dinner:

The evening passed quietly, unmarked by anything extraordinary. The acknowledged lovers (Jane and Bingley) talked and laughed; the unacknowledged (Lizzy and Darcy) were silent. Darcy was not of a disposition in which happiness overflows in mirth; and Elizabeth, agitated and confused, rather knew that she was happy, than felt herself to be so; for, besides the immediate embarrassment . . . she was aware that no one liked him but Jane; and even feared that with the others, it was a dislike which not all his fortune and consequence might do away.